MANAGEMENT/LEADERSHIP SPECIAL...Leadership success in EIGHT easy STEPS

Leadership success in EIGHT easy STEPS

AS the war for talent carries itself forward, organisations need to harbour a more serious approach toward leadership development. It is now clear that people don’t just leave organisations because of their managers; they also leave organisations for better development opportunities. If that is the case, then what do organisations have to pursue to build the leadership development as their core focus?

1 TALENT development as a strategic priority: As organisations have aggressive growth plans, they need to clearly define the talent capital needs – for now and for the future – to support your organisation’s strategic and cultural priorities;

2 BASED on your organisation’s business needs, articulate the leadership landscape. Determine the key levers w.r.t human capital that you will take for your organisation to succeed over the next three to five years. Seek an answer to ,‘what are the key challenges that leaders must face to successfully execute on your business priorities?’;

3 IDENTIFY your high-potential leaders. Identify those leaders in your organisation who demonstrate the highest promise to be great leaders. But be careful of a common trap – high performance is not equal to high potential;

4 ASSESS readiness. How do you know who’s ready for a key role—and who’s not? Gauge readiness of leaders to assume leadership roles in your organisation. Leverage the assessment and selection data you collect to make successful hiring and promotion decisions. Be sure you don’t again confuse between performance, potential and readiness. While the performance is more tangible, potential is the propensity to move up the ladder and readiness is the ability to take on the new responsibility in a specific period of time;

5 TARGETED development: While many might say they do this one well, there is a difference in targeted development and generic leadership development. Targeted development is a focal area of the role requirements, department needs and organisational goals. It’s not a pill or patch – it’s a journey. And you will have to help them walk through it;

6 ROLE of the senior leadership: It is often found that organisations do a good job of identifying potential leaders for the future. And some also offer good targeted development, but very few organisations believe senior leaders play a critical role in the successful transition. It’s not only the job of HR, but also the business to help build the future leaders in a more holistic way;

7 DEPLOY talent. Decide how you will deploy your talent. At the end of the day, the ultimate objective is to determine who will have the highest probability of achieving your vision and executing successfully against your business and cultural priorities;

8 ENSURE alignment and accountability for performance. Actively manage and track performance metrics—performance management practices, and day-to-day coaching. AMOGH DESHMUKH , key member leadership team, DDI India.  TAS 130123